My family received a copy of Crown War for the purposes of this review, but all opinions here are our own.

Review: Crown WarOverview and Theme:

Crown War is a delightfully hands-on rethinking of the traditional card game War using chunky, stacking checkers instead of a deck of cards and sitting proudly on the shelf in a bold red turret.

Components and Setup:

Crown War arrives with multilingual rules and 60 thick, sturdy stacking coins all packed in an adorable plastic container complete with crenelations.

Let your young friends spread the coins out across the table, crown side up, and give them a good mix. Review with them what the different faces do, and you're ready to play!

Game Play and Mechanics:

Gameplay is very easy to understand even for our littlest gaming friends. Each player chooses a coin at random from the middle of the table, and then you all reveal what you found. Most of the coins have a number from 1 to 5. The player with the highest value wins all the coins and adds them to their own growing stack. When all the coins have been taken, the player with the tallest stack wins!

Just like in regular War, if the two highest values are a tie, the tied players draw again to determine who wins all those coins.

The royalty coins add just an extra breeze from the winds of fate to your game:

King - wins over all numbers as well as the Queen and the Prince; gets 2 coins from each other player
Queen - wins over all numbers and the Prince; gets 2 coins from any one player
Prince - wins over all numbers; each other player must put 2 coins back in the center of the table
Joker - wins over all other coins; may switch piles with another player
Bankruptcy - loses to all other coins; must put half their pile back in the center of the table

These funny faces mixed in with all the numbers kept my little friends squealing in delight and quite often shifted the outcome of the game. Oh, when Dad had a huge tower growing but then pulled the Bankruptcy coin, what a celebration everyone else had!

The Good:

Crown War successfully mixes an old standard game that most folks know how to play with a few new mechanics and the faster pace of going through one set of coins instead of through the deck of cards over and over. It is easy to teach to young gamers and quick enough to play many times in a row. As a gameschooling mom, I know that this little game of number sense and gentle probability is going to be a favorite for a long time. It has been great with friends from 4 on up through adults!

Everyone who popped the top off the tower-shaped container adored the chunky pieces: they feel great for little and big hands to grab, flip, and stack... I am a sucker for a great sensory experience in a game, and Crown War delivers.

The Bad:

I don't think there's anything bad to be said! Maybe they could include a laminated card reminding players of what each face-coin does?

Players Who Like:

Crown War is an excellent choice especially for younger gamers who like a little extra competition in their game - fans of My First UNO or Go Fish should give it a try.

Final Thoughts:

Crown War was an instant success for our family and our gameschooling friends, and I am very glad that the pieces are so durable because I can tell that we have many, many wars in our future!

Check out Crown War on:

Alexa Chaplin- Reviewer

My name is Alexa: I'm a life-long game player and homeschooling mom to two awesome kids. I've loved board games since my early days playing Scrabble and Gin Rummy with my grandmother, and life only got more interesting when I married a Battletech enthusiast and fellow game lover. We've played games with our kids since they were small, and I helped start a thriving homeschool co-op where we have weekly sessions of board games with kids. In a family with kids raised on Catan and Pandemic, life is sure to be fun! You may run into me on Twitter, BoardGameGeek, and other social media as MamaGames. Be sure to say hi!